UK advertising industry body unveils Adland's 47 'game changers' of the last century — the list is 100% white and includes 6 women

Ogilvy & Mather founder David Ogilvy appears on the list.Ogilvy & Mather
UK advertising agency trade body the IPA (the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising) is celebrating its centenary with a "Festival of British Advertising," which also includes the a homage to the British ad industry's "game changers" from the last 100 years.

The list of 47 people includes just six women. And everyone on the list is white.

In a press release, the IPA says it assembled a panel of industry experts to draw up a long list of candidates.

The IPA was responsible for picking out the final 47.

"Obviously it's disappointing when you do an exercise like this and look at the names, as you spotted, it's predominantly white men," IPA director general Paul Bainsfair told Business Insider. "The only thing I can say is to look at the context of what we are doing, which is a retrospective of the last 100 years, it's the process we went through. We assembled a big group of advertising practitioners to take a long view, who have been around a long time, to look through who had been the game changers who had made an outstanding contribution."

The IPA describes the winners in a press release as the people whom it believes "have been mainly responsible for changing the industry, either as a leader, a creative, a strategist, or as an innovator." They will be recognized at an exhibition held in the Old Truman Brewery in London from March 9 to March 12.

Some members of the the judging panel raised concerns that the list may be too male and white-heavy, Bainsfair said. He added the IPA had a "responsibility to reflect accurately, rather than using positive discrimination and rigging it."

"The honest fact of the matter is that it reflects how dominated by men the ad industry has been for the last 100 years," Bainsfair said.

That's not to say the IPA has any intention of it staying that way.

Bainsfair pointed out that the IPA is now "working very much in the forefront" when it comes to pushing for greater diversity within the ad industry.

The IPA's census figures show that there was a drop in the number of females holding executive management positions between 2015 and 2016 and only 12% of those employed by IPA member agencies were not white.

When asked whether it would have been a better idea to create a list that looks at the game-changers of tomorrow, rather than celebrating a group of people who have likely received many other accolades in their storied careers, Bainsfair responded that the list was deliberately nostalgic and not designed to show the way forward.

"People will be interested in names like David Ogilvy, and Dave Trott, and John Hegarty. We all know the names, but the main free flow in the exhibition and footfall will be lots of advertising students who are learning about the business," Bainsfair said.

Here's the IPA's full list of the advertising industry's "game changers" from the past 100 years (females in bold):